Overview
IRG Court Watch tracks the litigation that will reshape how Wisconsin is governed. The cases below—drawn from the Wisconsin Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals, the state’s circuit courts, and the federal courts—are the matters most likely to redraw the boundaries between Wisconsin’s branches of government, the integrity of its elections, the scope of its administrative agencies, the protection of constitutional rights, and the climate for civil liability and public-policy reform.
For each case, the full report covers three things: the issue, why it matters, and what’s next. This is a living document—it will be updated as cases are filed, briefed, argued, and decided. The summaries below introduce each matter; the full PDF contains the complete analysis and a quick-reference index.
Pending at the Wisconsin Supreme Court
Decisions from Wisconsin’s highest court bind every lower court and every state agency. The cases pending here will define Wisconsin constitutional and statutory law for years to come.
Can the Attorney General fund his agency outside the state budget?
The Legislature alleges Attorney General Josh Kaul is evading the requirement that DOJ settlement funds—including a portion of Wisconsin’s $420 million share of the national opioid settlement—be deposited into the state’s general fund, instead routing them into a DOJ-controlled subaccount shielded from biennial-budget oversight. A ruling for the Attorney General would make AG-driven settlements a permanent, self-funding mechanism.
Can Wisconsin still hand out college aid by race?
Five taxpayers challenge a state college-grant program restricted to students of specified racial backgrounds under Wisconsin’s equal-protection guarantee—the first state-supreme-court case in the country to test whether the U.S. Supreme Court’s Students for Fair Admissions decision reaches state spending. Argued February 11, 2026; a decision is expected by the end of the June 2026 term.
Can the public verify that ineligible voters are removed from the rolls?
A challenge over public access to the records needed to confirm that ineligible voters are being removed from Wisconsin’s registration rolls—a transparency question with direct bearing on confidence in list-maintenance practices.
Is an unborn child a “patient” under Wisconsin civil law?
An eleven-year-old injured during delivery alleges his physician never had the informed-consent discussion required by Wis. Stat. § 448.30. A holding that an unborn child is a statutory “patient” would be the first time the Court recognizes an unborn child as a legal person in a civil-rights context. Argued April 21, 2026.
Can state agencies regulate without going through rulemaking?
The DNR designates air-quality “background concentration” zones through an internal protocol it has used since 2007–08 without ever adopting it as a formal rule. The case tests whether agencies may impose binding standards while bypassing the rulemaking process.
Can tribal sovereign immunity void recorded property covenants?
After residential lots subject to recorded restrictive covenants were conveyed into federal trust for the Menominee Tribe, the property owners’ association seeks a declaration that its covenants still bind the parcels—raising whether tribal sovereign immunity and the Menominee Restoration Act override existing property rights.
Pending at the Wisconsin Court of Appeals
The Court of Appeals is where Wisconsin appellate doctrine is built. The case below is the next front in the fight over the most consequential conservative reform of the Walker era.
Will the new Supreme Court majority undo Act 10?
A Dane County circuit judge struck down core provisions of 2011 Wisconsin Act 10 in December 2024. The appeal is the foundational test of whether the new liberal Supreme Court majority will overturn the reform credited with $18–35 billion in cumulative taxpayer savings. The judgment is stayed pending appeal, so Act 10 remains in force.
Pending in Wisconsin Circuit Court
Trial-court litigation is where factual records are built and where the legal theories that drive appellate decisions are first tested. The cases below are the early-stage fights that will define which cases reach the higher courts next.
Can the Attorney General settle state lawsuits without legislative approval?
The Attorney General, DOJ, and Governor Evers seek to extend the Supreme Court’s 2025 Kaul I ruling to strip the Joint Finance Committee of oversight over essentially every category of state civil litigation—the last meaningful remnant of Act 369’s litigation-control regime.
Was post-2020 Wisconsin election lawyering a felony?
Three lawyers central to the 2020 Trump campaign’s post-election strategy in Wisconsin each face eleven felony-forgery counts over the alternate-elector certificate. With Michigan’s case dismissed and Georgia’s collapsed, this is now the most viable surviving alternate-elector prosecution in the country.
Can a court compel Wisconsin to deliver and mark absentee ballots electronically?
Plaintiffs argue federal disability law requires Wisconsin to build electronic absentee-ballot infrastructure for voters with print disabilities—the wedge case against Act 75, the post-2011 reform that confined electronic absentee balloting to military and overseas voters. Trial begins July 27, 2026.
Will Wisconsin’s congressional map be redrawn before 2028?
A challenge seeking to have Wisconsin’s congressional map redrawn before the 2028 cycle—the next major redistricting fight after the legislative-map litigation of recent terms.
Can a court order the Legislature to spend more on schools—and dismantle school choice in the process?
A 19-plaintiff coalition claims Wisconsin’s school-finance system violates the constitution’s “uniform common schools” clause. A merits ruling for plaintiffs could force court-supervised K-12 spending increases and trigger collateral attacks on the Wisconsin Parental Choice Program and the state’s other school-choice programs.
Wisconsin Supreme Court Orders & Rule Petitions
The Supreme Court’s rulemaking authority over the practice of law and the conduct of the bench produces orders every bit as consequential as judicial opinions. The petition below is the most important rules matter pending in 2026.
Who has to step off the bench when their campaign donors come to court?
Nine retired circuit judges petition to make judicial recusal mandatory—rather than discretionary—when a party, attorney, or law firm has made campaign contributions raising a reasonable question about a judge’s impartiality. Because Wisconsin does not substitute a justice who recuses, the rule’s precise wording carries real stakes for the balance of the Court.
Federal Cases Impacting Wisconsin State Government
Federal litigation routinely produces rulings that bind Wisconsin state and local officials, restrain or expand the state’s enforcement authority, or determine the legality of Wisconsin election administration. The three cases below are the federal proceedings most likely to affect how Wisconsin is governed in the next eighteen months.
Can Wisconsin sheriffs cooperate with ICE?
An immigrant-rights group has sued five Wisconsin sheriffs, arguing they have no authority under state law to honor civil ICE detainers. A merits win for the challengers would, in effect, install a court-imposed sanctuary regime across Wisconsin’s seventy-two counties.
Can Washington force Wisconsin to hand over the voter rolls?
The U.S. Department of Justice has sued WEC to compel production of Wisconsin’s full unredacted statewide voter-registration list—including dates of birth, addresses, and partial Social Security numbers—notwithstanding a Wisconsin statute that restricts disclosure.
Can a state judge be prosecuted for blocking a federal arrest?
A federal jury convicted former Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan of felony obstruction—a case testing the federal prosecution of a sitting state judge arising from an immigration-enforcement encounter at the courthouse.
This summary introduces each matter tracked in the report. For the complete analysis—the issue, why it matters, what’s next, and the quick-reference index of every case, court, and counsel of record—download the full PDF.